


A Little Faith

by Severina



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tv-universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-05-02 13:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5249828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Trouble on a supply run.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Faith

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the One Little Spark challenge at LJ's tv_universe, for the prompt "menace"
> 
> * * *

There's too many of them.

Daryl runs flat out, the long grass swishing against his calves. A flash of gold from his right side now and again lets him know that Beth is matching his pace. He leaps over a fallen bench and nearly stumbles, catches himself before his knee gives out completely. He sees Beth hesitate, her hand coming up; waves her away and puts his own head down, redoubles his efforts. His chest is a bellows of fire but a glance over his shoulder shows the walkers still streaming from between the buildings, from alleys and doorways, from behind the crumpled barricades. So many that the ones that stagger and fall just get crushed by the geeks in their wake. 

Should've been a simple supply run. They'd scoped out the town with the binoculars before they went in; nothing stirred for the hour they'd watched, side by side on the slope, trading a water bottle and a granola bar back in forth under the hot sun. Impossible that a herd this size could've been lurking in back yards and dark corners, but the truth was snapping at his heels and sending up that moaning cry that'll just draw even more of 'em out of hiding.

The border of the town park is coming up quicker than he hoped. Small post-war houses line the street, and already he can see figures detaching themselves from the shadows of overgrown bushes and the narrow pathways between the homes. They reach out skeletal hands and join the chorus.

"Too many," Beth huffs out. 

He steals a glance. Sweat plasters her hair to her face, coats her in a sheen of oily perspiration and drenches her polo. She's still the prettiest thing he's ever seen.

"Just keep movin'."

He sees her ponytail bob out of the corner of his eye as she shakes her head. "We gotta split up," she says. "Draw some of 'em off."

No. A thousand times no. A million times no. They ain't separating, not after what happened last time. He's not risking losing her again – and this time it won't be to some crazy control freaks in a hospital, it'll be for good. He won't. He _can't_. He just doesn't have the strength. 

He pumps his legs harder and she keeps up, but the street is coming up fast. She don't say another word but he can hear her thinking at him all the same. Hear that logical voice of hers whispering in his brain.

Shit.

"I'll take left," he finally grunts out when they're running out of grass. He looks over at her in time to see her nod in assent, her eyes already scanning ahead to scope out a path to the right. "We meet by that gazebo we saw comin' in, the one with the blue roof. You remember?"

"I remember."

"Two hours," he says. "If I ain't there by then, make your way back to base. You got it?"

She looks at him then, for the first time since the walkers spilled out everywhere and they dropped the backpacks half loaded with food and supplies and started running. When she smiles at him, it's like they're still back in the little barracks room they claimed for their own. Like they're safe behind twelve foot brick walls and barbed wire and not running for their lives. "You'll be there," she says.

She peels off to the right almost as soon as she's done speaking, but Daryl hesitates, half-jogging in place. He watches her sprint up the middle of the boulevard, her long ponytail streaming out behind her. Watches until the walkers are too close to him for comfort; 'til he can smell the rancid stench of them and hear their brittle teeth snapping in anticipation. He turns to face them and bounces on his toes, teeth clenched. "C'mon, fuckers," he mutters.

Then he runs.

He glances over his shoulder only once, to confirm that the majority of the pack followed the closest tasty morsel. But there are less of the bastards on his heels than he hoped. He curses under his breath and throws up a quick hope for Beth's safety before he darts into the narrow passage between two brick houses; adds in a prayer that nothing comes in through the other end of the alley before he emerges into the backyard. For once it seems like God is listening.

It takes him an hour to lose the pack, scrambling over fences that they can't scale and through thorny brambles that trap them in a greedy grasp. He picks off the remainders with a few bolts and wades through more with his knife, and the few that remain he loses in a maze of modern apartment blocks on the west side of the city.

He's back at the gazebo with half an hour to spare; prowls around the edges of the little backyard with his skin prickling. He finally climbs up onto the roof and shields his eyes to scan the area. Spots a single walker three houses down, trapped in a sunken pool and sloshing through the knee-high water. Several dead bodies, little more than skeletons, slumped against the wall of a garden shed. No flash of bright yellow moving through the thick shrubbery. No bright blue eyes gazing up at him as she hurries to the meeting spot. 

He stays up on the roof until the sun goes down and only inky darkness remains. His body thrums with the need to go searching, as much as he knows that it'd be suicide when he can barely see twenty feet ahead and there's still a bunch of walkers out there just itching to reform into another herd. He lies on the roof and stares up at the stars and tells himself that he ain't gonna do Beth any good running around half-cocked in the dark. But the stars blink and mock him, reminding him that he already failed her once; he ran and ran, but she still ended up trapped, still ended up hurt and abused and tormented, and this time it ain't gonna be bad cops in a souped up car that fuck her over. 

This time she's gonna end up dead.

* ~ * ~ *

"You left her _alone_?"

Daryl staggers back from the punch, his left hand coming up instinctively to rub at his jaw. Maggie don't give a shit; she's drawing back to land another one when Glenn snags at her arm and pulls her away. She fights him, but the kid's stronger than he looks. He wraps both arms around Maggie's torso and holds her back, but the strain shows in his biceps. Maggie's a shitload stronger than _she_ looks, too.

"Girl can take care of herself," he says.

He knows it's true. Beth got through Grady, nursed Carol back to health, got Noah the hell out of there. She can dodge some walkers and make her way to shelter. Probably holed up somewhere for the night and is makin' her way back to them right now.

Except he retraced their steps to where they parted at the park and searched an every widening radius from where he last saw her running down the street and— 

He looked and looked, and—

"We're goin' after her," Maggie says. 

She pushes out of Glenn's arms, glares at Daryl like he'd every deny it. Like he'd just shrug and say 'lost another one' and carry on with his damn life? He fights the surge of anger that roils up, but it still comes out in the sharp movements of his hands as he heaves water bottles into another backpack and shoves buckles closed. He breathes out through his nose and tries to remember that Maggie is just as worried as he is. Won't do no good to lash out at her now.

"'Course we are," Glenn says. 

Peacemaker Glenn. Daryl pushes back another burst of anger at that thought; slides the backpack over his shoulders. He needs to focus on what needs doing, not on anything else. Not on anyone else. Just Beth.

"Who's comin'?" he asks.

* * *

It's too much like before. Sure, now he's behind the wheel of an old army jeep instead of lurching down the road, and he's got Maggie vibrating with energy next to him and Glenn and Noah following in the rear. But it's still the same – his girl's gone and he can't track her and he couldn't keep her safe. He's running in circles.

He slams the palm of his hand down on the wheel, sees Maggie jerk out of the corner of his eye. "Sorry," he mumbles.

He feels her shift on the worn seat, glances away from the road to see her biting at her bottom lip as she stares out the passenger window. It reminds him eerily of Beth, and he turns his attention back to the blacktop before the pain in his chest can come tumbling out of his mouth and spill all over the jeep. 

"Sorry I punched you," she says when they've gone another mile. "Before."

His jaw still aches. "Got a hell of a right hook."

He doesn't have to look to know she's smiling just a little. Or to know when her face sobers. He doesn't twitch when her hand comes down to rest on his forearm, though it's a near thing. He's nearly thrumming out of his skin with energy himself. "We'll find her," she says.

"We will," Daryl agrees. "Beth's tough."

He says the words. But he remembers feeling like his heart was going to come bursting out of his chest like that creature from _Alien_ ; remembers legs like lead and sweat burning his eyes. Remembers the endless road, and no sign of the car with the cross for hours and hours. No sign of Beth, and every step reminding him that he failed, that she was gone.

He tried to have faith, then as now, but it was damn fucking difficult.

He looks away to swipe his arm over his eyes. Tells himself it's just sweat. But when Maggie's blunt nails dig into his skin, her body suddenly tense beside him, he darts his attention back to the road. Squints into the sunlight.

A golden spark of light in the middle of the road ahead.

He slams on the brakes and spins out into the road, tired squealing, the jeep rocking; is out of the vehicle before it has completely stopped moving. Nothing but white noise in his head. 

His feet eat up the pavement and he's got her in his arms before he manages to breathe again. She squeals and he knows he's probably crushing her but he can't let go; lifts her off her feet and buries his nose in her hair and blinks back the tears that are threatening to spill. She's here. Real, alive, her skin warm from the sun; sweaty and dirt-streaked and gorgeous. Safe. With him. Her arms wrap around his neck and she sighs against his ear, and his arms tremble as he holds her tight and tries to crawl inside her. Her heartbeat is steady and strong against the rapid patter of his own.

He's only able to let her go when Maggie careens up next to him, nearly falling over in her haste. But he still stands close, shoulder brushing Beth's, unwilling to move away from her even a little as Maggie embraces her sister and cups her cheeks and cries enough tears for them both.

"Don't ever do that to me again," Maggie finally snuffles out with a half-laugh. 

"I'm sorry. I knew you'd be so worried," Beth says. Her big blue eyes are wide as she pull Maggie into another hug before letting her go. She blinks up at him through her lashes. "I got caught in a dead end, so I had to hunker down for the night. I tried the gazebo in the morning, but—"

"I was gone," Daryl says. His fault. No matter what he does, no matter how many promises he makes to himself, he always ends up breaking them. He always ends up losing her. If he'd been a little more patient instead of peeling out at first light, she'd have found him there. Could've been safe and sound hours earlier instead of wandering around some overrun hick town all on her own.

"As you should've been," Beth admonishes him. "If you'd still been there, I'd'a been so pissed at you." She reaches out to slap at his chest, but the sting is light – and he takes the opportunity to reach out and snag her hand and slide his fingers through hers. Only when he's got hold of her again does his heart start to find its normal rhythm. She grins up at him and squeezes his hand, and it's like the sun coming out after a cloudy day. He basks in her. 

"And you decided to do some shopping while you were gone," Maggie says.

Only then does Daryl see beyond Beth's bright smile, her shining eyes. He blinks. "The hell?"

Beth looks over her shoulder at the overloaded red wagon, and smiles up at him again as she shrugs. "I went back to where we dropped our stuff," she says. "Weren't no walkers around, so I gathered up what we had and then figured I could get a few more supplies while I was there. Then I needed something to carry them in—"

"So you, what, raided a toy store?" Glenn asks as he reaches them and pulls her into a brief hug.

"Saw it in a backyard when I was runnin'," Beth explains. Her smile falters then, just a little. Probably she'll tell him what else she saw in that backyard. Probably tonight, when the sweat is cooling on their skin and she's wrapped up in his arms where he can keep her safe. But now there is just the shadow of sadness on her face before she shakes herself and continues. "Couldn't get any of the cars to start, so I went back to get it. And here I am."

"Here you are," Maggie repeats as she hugs her again.

Daryl reluctantly releases Beth's hand when Maggie slings an arm around her shoulders to lead her to the jeep. Glenn falls into step beside them, so it's up to Daryl to stoop to the handle of the wagon and pull it after them. He spies their faded grey knapsacks, but the meagre supplies that he and Beth had managed to scavenge before the day went to shit are nearly buried under the sheer mass of food and toiletries that are stuffed into the red wagon. Hell, she even managed to find a few toys for the kids.

He shakes his head, trudges after them toward the jeep skewed in the middle of the road. The back wheel of the wagon squeaks shrilly with every turn, and he winces at the thought of Beth walking through town with that noise announcing her presence to every damn walker within hearing distance. She wouldn't have had to risk if it he'd—

"C'mon, slowpoke!" Beth calls back to him.

She's smiling again, her whole body lit up with it. She doesn't wait for him to respond, just turns back and starts answering Maggie's question about the layout of the town. He listens to her describe the pharmacy she raided by climbing through a back window into an untouched storeroom, and shimmying up a drainpipe to reach the apartment above a barbershop where she spent the night on a musty bed, and the two walkers she took out with her blade inside the toy store – she really did raid a fuckin' toy store – so she could grab the stuffed animals and puzzles for Judith and Thomas. 

He tells the others that Beth is tough, and strong, and infinitely capable of taking care of herself. He's known it since she kept him going when he would've lain down and died out there in the woods; he might have just let the walkers take him when the prison fell if Beth hadn't been with him. 

But believing it might be another matter entirely.

He wants to take care of her. Needs to, just like he needs water and air. But Beth ain't no delicate flower. She's clever and capable and she doesn't need anyone to keep her safe. Not even him. She can do that all on her own, and he needs to start believing that in his heart instead of just knowing it in his head. 

He puts on a little speed and runs to catch up to them, the wagon wheel squealing in protest, and nudges Glenn out of the way to take Beth's hand in his free one. She gives him a quick smile before returning to her story, and he squeezes her hand gently and just marvels at the sight of her. Her infectious smile, her bobbing ponytail, her bright inquisitive eyes, her joy in life just oozing out of her pores and saturating the air. She's self-sufficient and resilient and she can take care of herself.

It wouldn't kill him to have a little faith.


End file.
